1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to a depilating device for removing superfluous hairs from the skin for aesthetic reasons or the like.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Depilating devices are known, for example, in Japanese utility model publication (KOKOKU) No. 57-54725 and in European Patent Specification No. 0,328,426. The Japanese publication discloses using a pair of rollers which are in rolling contact with each other to catch the hairs between the rollers and pull the hairs out of the skin while rotating the rollers. This device is, however, capable of plucking only a small amount of the hairs at a time and is therefore rather ineffective. The European patent discloses the use of a series of pinching disks supported on a rotating shaft. Each alternate disk is connected to levers to be reciprocated thereby along the axis of the shaft as the disks rotate about the axis in such a manner that each alternate disk is caused to repeat clamping the hairs between the adjacent disks and releasing the same during the rotary movement of the disks, thereby plucking the hairs from the skin periodically. The levers are interconnected through each alternate disk to the shaft to be rotatable therewith about the shaft axis and is also linked to a rotating cam with its one end urged by a spring against a cam surface such that the levers are caused to reciprocate along the shaft axis by the cam against the spring bias. With this arrangement, a spring load is constantly applied to the contacting surface between the cam and the one end of the lever, which incurs a relatively large rotational load and therefore requires a powerful motor to rotate the shaft and reciprocate the levers as compensating for the relatively large rotational load. Further, since the disks are displaced by the levers under the bias of the spring, the disks are brought into contacting engagement with the adjacent disks with a loud impact noise at the time to clamping the hairs therebetween. Consequently, in spite of that the device is capable of plucking a large amount of the hairs with the use of a number of the disks arranged along the shaft axis, the device suffers from problems that it necessitates the motor of relatively great power and therefore of large configuration as well as it produces high level noise during the plucking operation.